Changing rooms are a place of crisis. I dare you to disagree. When was the last time you felt elated standing alone in the confines of a changing room? A dress-finding mission can, too quickly, become a fault-finding mission, a mission in self-denigration. To start with, there is the trauma of the bare self standing … Continue reading The Art of Changing
Kate, my niece, is making a Recency-style Spencer jacket; she downloaded the pattern from the internet. ‘It’s spare on instructions,’ she tells me. ‘It says things like – then attach the arm, and not a word more.’ She is a surgeon with fabric, and can, somehow, execute this reverse amputation with minimum trial and error and … Continue reading Unpick and Start Again
I have a card box filled with a mix of birthday, new baby, sympathy, thank you, and left over Christmas cards. And I have a few of the ‘blank for your own message’ type, the ones I come across and buy thinking, ‘that’s perfect for so and so’ and then I forget ever to send … Continue reading Ironing
‘You need a man.’ I looked M. up and down before I told her, but her want of a man was obvious, and urgent. ‘Preferably a well-proportioned one.’ M. looked around the shop surreptitiously, as though preparing to sneak up on one, pounce and grab him. But this was a man-free shop. The two women … Continue reading Coats On
Once upon a time, when I lived in Dublin, I dreamed of owning a Donegal Tweed overcoat: tailored, to the knee, single breasted, with a 100-year guarantee (isn't that how long they last?). Specifically, the coat of my dreams was to come from Kevin and Howlin, a traditional outfitters on Nassau Street, down the side … Continue reading Jacket
Edinburgh is neither boastful nor pompous, which is not to say that this is a modest city. I’m not saying it’s in any way conceited, but I would characterise it as a place that quietly, but most assuredly, knows itself. It is definitely not a city given to swagger. It doesn’t strut like Danny Zuko or wiggle … Continue reading Dressing Up Box
Three months into my self-imposed ban on clothes shopping and I’m sticking to it fairly well. I’ve slipped only once; last week when I bought four pairs of socks, but other than that, no temptations, inclinations or straying from the path of non-consumption. Yes, all was well, until my visit to London at the weekend … Continue reading Old Clothes
My Edinburgh Press 